By: Melanie Thompson

How about sneaking in some healthy add-ins when the kids aren’t looking?  When my kids were young, I would make spaghetti sauce and add about a cup of pure pumpkin into the sauce.  They didn’t even know they were eating it, and it gave them a boost of nutrition. 

You can buy pumpkin in the canned goods section where the pie fillings are sold.  Most canned pumpkin in that section is going to be pure pumpkin—if you’re putting it into the spaghetti sauce, you don’t want pumpkin pie filling.  I imagine that if the pumpkin is laced with cinnamon and nutmeg that your kids might notice a difference in the taste of their spaghetti sauce.  Read the can label; if it only lists pumpkin, or pumpkin and water, that is what you are looking for. 

You can also cut a small pie pumpkin in half, pull out the seeds and guts, lay it in a pan with about an inch of water, cut-side down, and bake it for an hour (I bake both halves at the same time—the ‘extra’ pumpkin freezes well).  After it is baked, the edible part of the pumpkin will scrape very easily out of the shell. 

I generally use a canned spaghetti sauce which has about 24 ounces in the can.  To this, I would add about 1 cup, or 8 ounces of pumpkin.  It is VERY important that your kids or significant other not catch you in the act of doing this, however.  My second-born daughter caught me doing this, told her sisters and brother, and I am now watched like a hawk when I make spaghetti.  What my kids didn’t realize is that I was doing this for years before they caught me.

Another option for secretly adding nutrition is to add cooked cauliflower to mashed potatoes.  Depending upon the amount of mashed potatoes I’m making, I can easily get by with adding a cup or two of cooked cauliflower into the mashed potatoes without altering the taste of the potatoes.  Again, you might have to sneak around to get this done, but I promise it is worth it! 

The potatoes will take a bit longer to cook than the cauliflower, so let the potatoes cook for about five minutes before adding your cauliflower to the pot to finish boiling.  Once the potatoes are soft, just mash the potatoes and cauliflower like you would regularly do and finish with your favorite add-ins.  Voila!  Healthier mashed potatoes!

Adding more fruits and vegetables to your diet seems daunting, but really a ½ cup of vegetables isn’t that much.  One of our healthcare workers at ELVPHD once showed me a ½ cup measuring cup and asked if I could eat that many green beans when I was complaining that I found it difficult to add more vegetables to my diet.  Actually look at a ½ cup measuring cup—it’s not that big.  You, too, can find ways to add more vegetables to your diet and to your family’s diet.  Providing your bodies with the nutrition they need doesn’t have to be difficult; you can do it!